Anti-Discrimination

In 2012, the Rapid Response Unit (RRU) was formed through the efforts of SWV. The Rapid Response Unit was created as a result of the issues our country faces and the violence against women that is prevailing in Armenia. The mission of RRU is to reveal domestic violence cases, strategically litigate, raise public awareness, ensure fair and transparent investigations of court trials, and provide media coverage. Thereby, contributing to the decrease of gender-based violence cases against women and the improvement of more effective mechanisms and strategies at the state level.

To achieve these goals, the RRU team cooperates with existing hotlines and crisis centers for women and the police. One success of the RRU was the creation of an online platform - http://rru.swv.am. This provides the opportunity for all people to report cases of gender-based violence from any place and at any time. By pinning their location on the map, the RRU team can investigate cases of gender-based violence, respond to it and provide future assistance. Anyone in the world has access to the RRU website to read about the reported cases.

On August 9th a round table discussion entitled "Violence among adolescent couples" took place. The purpose of the event was to present the research on "Violence among young couples" within the framework of "Love and Respect preventing teen dating violence" campaign, online quizzes, website and social media campaigns to discuss the current situation and the existing legislative changes and come up with suggestions for improvement.

At the beginning of the meeting, Project Coordinator Sona Arakelyan delivered the opening speech and presented the results of the research. Later the speakers of the meeting reflected on the current situation and the necessary legislative changes.

The survey was conducted among 1,000 youth across Armenia to identify the prevalence of different types of violence among young couples, their impact, and possible ways in which young people find a way out of or improve unhealthy relationships.

The speakers of the meeting were Nelly Duryan - Head of the Department of Criminal Investigation for juvenile cases and Fight Against Domestic Violence of the RA Police, Deputy Chief of Control over the Legal Proceedings of the Interdepartmental Criminal Proceedings Shushanik Israelyan, and Deputy Director of the Legal and Legal Education Program at the Ministry of Justice Gayane Hovakimyan.

In the second part of the meeting, the youth ambassadors of the "Love and Respect preventing teen dating violence” campaign - Manan Zeynalyan and Maria Salmasyan, presented the online work done by the ambassadors, the opportunities that the online quizzes give. At the end of the meeting the participants expressed their readiness to continue the work and to use the positive experience of the ambassadors in order to inform the youth of the larger community.

Many people in the world celebrate Valentine's Day on February 14, but for many this day also highlights the violence against women. Every year the "Society Without Violence" NGO organizes events to raise the public’s awareness of this.

The "Society Without Violence"NGO on February 14, 2018, and in 2014 and 2016, joined the One Billion Rising campaign.

One Billion Rising is the biggest mass action to end the violence against women in human history. The campaign, launched on Valentine’s Day in 2012, began as a call to action based on the UN statistic that 1 in 3 women on the planet is beaten or raped during her lifetime.

This year's action took place at Charles Aznavour square, near Moscow Cinema. A group of girls tried to break the chain of silence with a flash mob dance. During the event, different booklets and leaflets were distributed to people passing by. The flashmob's goal was to call on all women and girls to be brave, determined, and unafraid to fight for their rights.

Society Without Violence NGO in cooperation with ILGA Europe organized a training session on May 4-6 in Aghveran, Armenia for psychologists, psychotherapists and sexologists. The session was led by two doctors with extensive experience in the field of medicine and human rights.

Dr. Stepan Matevosyan is a psychologist, psychotherapist and sexologist, as well as the director of the Endo-psychiatric Center of Moscow City. Dr. Vahe Asryan is a sexologist and a sitting member of Armenian Association of Sexologist.

The topics of the discussions were diverse. Dr. Asryan opened the sessions with his talk on “Sexual Orientation, Myths and Realities.” He presented the societal and political level of discrimination in Armenia, and then connected it to the health sector and further discussed the medical needs of homosexual persons. The discussion made it clear that the participants were not aware of the differences between gender identity and sexual orientation. In addition, the participants were unaware of the emotional and mental aspect of one's sexual orientation.

Next, Dr. Stepan Matevosyan led the second module on “Gender Identity, Myths and Reality” and also talked about “The Importance of Doctors’ Awareness During their Work with LGBT People.” This presentation brought about a heated discussion about discrimination against LGBT people.

During the session the medical needs of LGBT+ people were also discussed. Doctors’ indifference and lack of compassion, domestic pressure, lack of knowledge and the fear of being discovered were outlined.

In conclusion, the level of satisfaction of the participants was extremely high. They concluded that this type of sessions should be held more often in medical institutions and give knowledge about the medical needs of LGBT people.

16 days of activism against gender-based violence is coming to its end, but it lacked a single State announcement which would show the State’s support to the struggle against violence and discrimination. Yet already since 2011 the RA Government has adopted the National Action Plan to Combat Gender-Based Violence, as well as Strategic Action Plan for 2011-2015 which aims at promoting the reduction of gender-based violence.

The Action Plan, adopted 4 years ago, is quite ambitious and Armenia should have registered a serious progress in reducing gender-based violence in case it was completely implemented. We spoke to Armenuhi Tanashyan, the head of the Women’s Affairs Department of the RA Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, to understand to what extend and how the Action Plan was implemented.